Danger: Diabolik (1968, Mario Bava)

What you see above this sentence is one of the coolest posters ever to one of the coolest movies ever made.

Danger: Diabolik is based off of a famous Italian comic book at the time named Diabolik and this is present in almost every single frame of this film. Mario Bava uses his famous style to create what might be one of the funnest and coolest films I might ever see. It really does feel like you are watching a comic book for it's entire running time and I would easily rank it up there with Dick Tracy as a comic book film that actually looks, feels, and sounds just like a comic book.

The premise is simple - Diabolik is a master thief who loves the rush of stealing stuff for his girlfriend. That's it. That's the whole plot basically. I say this because no matter what happens in the film's plot as the film goes along like a police captain trying to catch him or a rival thief also trying to catch him...it doesn't matter. What does matter is that you are sure that Diabolik will not give a fuck, steal stuff, and make out with his hot girlfriend after or while he does this. He's just that cool. It's just hilarious seeing him laugh his ass off while stealing stuff or seeing him wink at the camera like hes telling you "you know what's up." So cool and hilarious and it's meant to be just that which makes it even better.

That's really all I got. I laughed hard and enjoyed every minute of it. There were a couple of small problems I had with the film. One of which being that the film probably has about 20 minutes of Diabolik just making out with his girlfriend in his cool underground layer while a cool Ennio Morricone score is playing. You kind of get the point after the first couple of times that this happens but it doesn't matter too much because every single one of these underground layer scenes is just another excuse for Bava to explode the frame with color and style.

Another thing worth pointing out is what Bava does in this film with such a low budget, a couple of actors, and camera tricks. it's very impressive and still holds up perfectly . I still cant tell what was actually there and what was just a painting mixed in with a camera trick.

I hope I can buy this one soon in order to enjoy it some more. This one really lives up to it's cult status. It's just so...cool.

- B+

Here is the Beastie Boys music video which uses scenes from the film. Also, very cool.